


How to Claim (It’s Not a Pink Slip)

by orange_8_hands



Series: Sweetheart [4]
Category: Supernatural
Genre: Claiming, Gen, Impala Fic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-01-01
Updated: 2012-01-01
Packaged: 2017-10-28 15:47:13
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 436
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/309472
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orange_8_hands/pseuds/orange_8_hands
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It wasn't John handing over the car keys</p>
            </blockquote>





	How to Claim (It’s Not a Pink Slip)

**Author's Note:**

> Originally posted on [my LJ](http://orange-8-hands.livejournal.com/1349.html), July 2011.

Dean is young when he becomes mine.

The father is being shoved into the backseat, the brother following, making a face I shudder in recognizing (the smell lingers for days), but following directions presses both hands to the gushing shoulder. He blanches even whiter as the father slumps down, but the boy is still shouting, cursing, and the brother keeps the pressure on.

The boy is slamming himself into the driver’s seat, barely able to see and press the peddles. He twists the key with shaking hands and drives about as well as expected – he has only just started lessons in driving, and he is scared, and he knows the father is dying.

I am not kind, nor am I cruel. I simply am.

But I remember the feel of the boy sitting on my hood, watching home burn, and I remember him curled around the brother as they slept, and I remember days and days as he turned me into a fort, a submarine, a castle, a time machine (once and never again), a space station. I remember the tears he shed in private and the laughs he gave always. I remember fingers running against my side doors, over my seats, across my trunk.

I bring him to the hospital. 

There is a rush of sound and noise and people and the father is being lifted away and the boy is following, one firm hand on the brother, and then someone else – I do not know him, I do not like him, but he parks me and leaves and it is a relief – and then silence.  

We are all subdued, in the parking lot of this hospital. I can feel the blood hardening into my seats. I hear a few murmurs, here and there, but mostly we are silent, waiting. This is a crossroads, we know, because sometimes the one who drove us here is not the one to drive us home. (I do not have a home, I am one; this is not my first time waiting but this is the first I worry.)  

Later, the boy comes back alone. He wipes the blood off, scrubbing hard, and I feel satisfaction curl. He cares for me like the father doesn’t always remember to. _So Sammy won’t see_ , he whispers, and stuffs the rags into a plastic bag.  

Then he is crying, messily but quietly, harshly but quickly. He leans against the seat and works on collecting himself. _Thank you_ , he finally adds, and I feel the sincerity settle into my frame, my bolts, the space in between.  

 _Dean_ , I sigh, and cradle him closer.  


End file.
